Friday, April 27, 2018

Politico: Reporters Covering TWH Are Tired

Politico Illustration by Michael Byers

An article at Politico does a deep drive into the realities of the White House beat, looking at what it’s like to cover the presidency and how that shapes what we know about the most powerful office in the world.

According to Politico, reporters, often the biggest names at their news organizations, find themselves having to bend to the whims of an early-rising 71-year-old who starts making news by blasting out aggrieved and, at times, outrageous tweets before the end of “Fox & Friends.” What was once one of the most prestigious gigs in journalism has become a daily slog. Craggy veterans crank out stories at odd hours as they scramble to report out the mercurial musings of a president who, with apologies to Lewis Carroll, believes as many as six impossible things before breakfast.

Major news organizations, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, rotate reporters each week to ensure that someone is up for the tweetstorms at dawn, and are hiring new correspondents to help with the expanded workload. Where presidential news once arrived on a fairly predictable schedule, the Times’ Peter Baker says the on-duty reporter now might have to knock out two stories before getting out of his or her pajamas.

“There’s no question that we’re all exhausted,” says Baker, who has covered the Clinton, George W. Bush and Obama White Houses. But, he continues, you “have to stop and remember this is an extraordinary story and is something we’re going to be talking to our kids and grandkids about.”

Other top White House reporters felt the same way—bone-tired, but still infused with the sense that they’re on a historic mission covering a norm-busting presidency. “I think we all want to say in 50 years we covered Donald Trump’s White House,” says the Washington Post’s Josh Dawsey.